In our own backyard we have our own Hainanese fishermen in the form of the Filipinos who keep going back and forth to Sabah or North Borneo simply because many of their close relatives live there and have lived there even before these became Malaysian territory.

There is so much government and media hype over the country’s disputes with China. First it was about the territorial dispute over the Spratly Islands. Now it is about the standoff at Scarborough shoal. It seems as if somebody is trying to stoke the tensions or create a crisis.